Ailsa's Blog: Meet Our Members: Pat Taylor
My older sister started having piano lessons when I was 5. To my great annoyance her piano teacher decreed that my hands were too small and made me wait a whole year before starting lessons. I was always very dutiful and stuck with it until, aged 11, I realised that the Moonlight Sonata was within my grasp. It was love from then on, helped along by my lovely teacher, Florence Fisher. I still have her copies of Beethoven sonatas from the early 1900s.
In the heady days of the 1970s, our school in Bournemouth had a selection of musical instruments we could learn and a fantastic woodwind teacher, Alan Melly who dragged me kicking and screaming (mostly with laughter) out of my rather prim shell. I took up the flute and got into school music activities in a big way and got to be 'music prefect' aged 16, giving me first dibs on every piano in the school. I also played in the orchestra and sang in the choir. 'Highlight' was when said flute teacher and Russian language teacher cooked up the idea of a Russian music evening for expatriate Russians living in Bournemouth at the time. Mostly this involved me playing and singing traditional songs, including a serenade where one enthusiastic audience member rushed up to the front, took over the microphone and sang the serenade to me. Only mildly excruciating.
For many years, I had only limited access to my piano – no room in my bedsit – and lost the habit of playing for other people. My playing became as rusty as my Russian. I am trying to overcome that and had a few lessons last year to up my game. In the meantime I have carried on singing, initially with a group of music students as Gli Amici della Musica at Christchurch Priory. I moved to Seaford in 2006 and joined the choral society in time to sing Purcell's Fairy Queen alongside fellow 'fairies' Margaret Darwall Smith and Whyla Lott, a real treat. I foolishly offered to help out with a 'bit of admin' and was Secretary for several years. Highlight performances were Elijah – with Matthew Rose and Felicity Lott - and the sublime Stabat Mater by Dvorak.
I left the choir soon after we moved to Jevington. My career has been in community development and social housing policy and development, for the last few years with Eastbourne Council. Year after year the cuts to local authorities meant that more work was piled on, including a lot that I wasn't at all interested in. Getting to Seaford after work was quite a challenge especially in foul weather so I took some time out. Now retired, I have gradually got back to doing the things that I love best, including singing with the Seaford Choral Society. It was lovely to get such a warm welcome when I came back last autumn.
I am definitely a musical 'snob', as Ailsa once called me. I love most classical music – favourites are Bach, Handel, Haydn, Britten and Poulenc – but I draw the line at singing Beatles tunes or songs from musicals. I have also been known to get up and dance – if the beat is right!
